If an investor had committed $1,000 in XRP when it first appeared on exchanges and held onto the tokens, how much would the investment be worth now?
XRP has come a long way from its humble beginnings, being one of the earliest crypto assets to hit the market. For context, the XRP Ledger (XRPL), which hosts the XRP token, debuted in June 2012. However, market data from CoinMarketCap and other analytics platforms does not provide information on XRP pricing before August 2013.
XRP Journey Since August 2013
According to CoinMarketCap, XRP’s earliest trading price as of Aug. 5, 2013, stood at $0.00587, worth nearly nothing to the average investor. With the total supply of 100 billion tokens, the entire XRP market had a valuation of $587 million at the time, a testament to its humble beginnings.
If an investor had committed $1,000 to XRP when it began trading, the individual would have procured 170,357 tokens at the $0.00587 price. Interestingly, at the end of 2013, these tokens would hold a value of $4,713, presenting returns of over $3,700 within four months.
However, if the investor held on, the worth of the tokens would have then plummeted to about $477 in July 2014, when XRP collapsed to its all-time low of $0.002802 amid a market downturn. Following this crash, XRP continued to trade below the opening price of $0.00587 until December 2014, when it recovered completely above $0.01.
Another drop occurred in 2015, and XRP consistently traded between $0.005 and $0.008 from 2015 to early 2017, with no clear direction during this period. Nonetheless, a decisive breakout occurred in March 2017, with XRP eventually crossing the $1 valuation for the first time in December 2017 and hitting $3.31 in January 2018.
How Much Would the $1,000 in XRP be Worth Today?
After years of sustained downtrend and underperformance, which some attribute to suppression mechanisms and the SEC lawsuit, XRP has again recovered above the $1 mark and now sits around $3.
Today, XRP changes hands at $3.3. At this price, the 170,357 tokens, procured with $1,000 in August 2013, would be worth $562,000. While XRP has not seen the same explosive growth as Bitcoin or Ethereum since their respective debuts, its overall trajectory has been upward since launch.
Comparison with Bitcoin
Notably, if the same investor had chosen to invest in Bitcoin at the time of XRP launch, they would have actually doubled their returns. Specifically, on Aug. 5, 2013, BTC traded for $100, and $1,000 would have amassed 10 BTC. Today, with Bitcoin changing hands at $116,684, the investment would be worth $1.16 million. This is $604,000 more than XRP returned.
XRP’s lower gains are largely due to its underperformance from 2018 to 2024, which most analysts have ascribed to the SEC lawsuit. Notably, it only started to recover from this predicament in November 2024 and has since outperformed the market.
Interestingly, for XRP to catch up to Bitcoin’s growth from August 2013, it would need to reach a price of $6.85 while BTC remains around the $116,000 mark. This would require a 107% increase from XRP’s current price and would make the 170,357 tokens worth about $1.16 million.
DisClamier: This content is informational and should not be considered financial advice. The views expressed in this article may include the author's personal opinions and do not reflect The Crypto Basic opinion. Readers are encouraged to do thorough research before making any investment decisions. The Crypto Basic is not responsible for any financial losses.
